Wait, let me get this straight: Ashlee Simpson is famous for being the sister of a girl who is famous for, what, being a blonde with big boobs? After being globally humiliated on Saturday Night Live, getting hilariously booed out of a college stadium, and becoming the modern-day poster child for nepotism, Ashlee now, logically, fancies herself an actress.

We live in one strange and confusing world.

Anyway, yeah, the younger Simpson semi-stars in Undiscovered, a film that could be accurately renamed The World's Most Generic Creation, and the only difference would be that a few movie critics would cut it some slack for being so honest.

The plot is as pre-packaged as a knock-knock joke. Semi-talented kids shoot for fame in L.A., only to argue, fight, bicker, avoid falling in love, and contend with everything from devious managers and asshole agents to sudden groupies and overnight loserdom. Undiscovered is like the Dollar Store of movie clichés.

Pell James (that's a girl) plays a mousy model who wannabe an actress. Steven Strait is a glowering alt-rockrrrr who wants to achieve fame on his own terms, dammit. Ashlee S. plays a sort-of sidekick / geek chorus / exposition machine amalgam who gets three full musical numbers, despite having maybe 2 dozen lines of dialogue. (Hey, thank Hollywood for small favors.)

The main plot, among 12 random mini-plotlets, is this: Pell and Strait looOoove each other, but every time they try to make out, either he's all "I'm not a rock star, I'm a musician!" or she's all "Omg, I have a boyfriend and I swore I'd never date another musician!" and they just keep avoiding each other's warm embrace until the entire pathetic farce is wrapped up with a finalé straight out of the Dollar Store finalé aisle. He loves her but she says no, then he loves her and she says no. The thing volleys on for 97 vicious minutes like the world's stupidest tennis match. And would you believe it; Undiscovered has the bald-faced audacity to end with the "race to the airport to profess my love before she leaves FOREVER" schpiel, for cryin' out loud.

As this 182nd-generation Fame Xerox is busy checking off its list of clichés, tropes, conventions, and stereotypes, its background is populated by folks like Fisher Stevens, Carrie Fisher, and Peter Weller, actors who have all seen better days ... and will probably never see Undiscovered.

The DVD

Video: Lions Gate releases the dud in an anamorphic widescreen format, but the flick's a pretty grainy affair anyway.

Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1 or 2.0, with optional subtitles in English and Spanish. Audio quality is pretty strong, but that's just another way of saying "the music is loud," and the music in this movie ... sucks.

Extras: 9 deleted scenes, 5 music videos, 28 still photos, 5 trailers, an 11-minute behind the scenes fluff piece, and 1 audio commentary with director Meiert Avis that I wouldn't listen to if you jammed a gun into one of my ears and an Ashlee Simpson CD into the other.

Final Thoughts

This thing makes Glitter look like gold. (Well, not really, but they're both really bad movies, and I just really enjoyed writing that comment.)